Included Studies
These nine studies20-28 were published between 1998 and 2017. A summary of the characteristics of the included studies is shown in Table 1. Three were done in Turkey22,26,28and one in each of the following countries: Canada20, US23, Saudi Arabia25, Venezuela27, Brazil21, and Bangladesh24. All of the studies were of parallel-group design, eight trials20-26,28 were double-blinded, and one was a simple blinded trial27. Six studies were performed in the ED20,22,23,25,27,28and three in hospitalized children21,24,26. Two studies20,27 were performed in the ED but also had some information for admitted patients, and one27 of those studies had a three-intervention-group design, but we included only information for our comparison criteria (ICS + SC vs. SC). One study25 allowed the inclusion of patients previously included in the study. All the studies included an asthma clinical severity score, but the score varied between studies (Table 1). Four studies20,23,25,28 reported funding information, and all of them were independently sponsored (not by the pharmaceutical industry). All except two studies21,22 had high methodological quality (Figure 2).